Thursday night is now just hours away. Soon the Jets will be on the clock. Alleged reports of who the Jets want at 18, unnamed sources who supposedly know the war room game plan, and media smoke screens out of Florham Park designed to detour the competition, will all be in play this week. The pace will be fast and furious. Get your seatbelts fastened folks and don’t jump every time you hear the word “Jets” in a sentence. Better to accept it all as part of the draft week hype than to overreact to every rumor and headline.

I’m gonna keep it short. My wish list? Just give me an impact WR, a TE who can stretch the middle of the field, and a CB (Darqueze Dennard?) who can start in year one and I don’t care how it’s done. Or what other needs are filled to go along with those three. Anything the Jets find on top of landing this trio I will consider to be a bonus.

Trade up, trade back, package picks, just do whatever it takes Mr Idzik. As long as you leave Radio City with two more playmakers in the passing game and a corner who can compete against NFL wideouts opposite Dee Milliner immediately.

There. That wasn’t too hard, was it? Now let’s see it happen, after the next seventy two hours of pre draft smoke clears.

Not Buying It Mike

So we hear that Michael Vick doesn’t want to come in here and ruffle any feathers. You know, cause any football distractions. He said last Friday that “Geno Smith is the starter” and that he is here to help him improve. He did so in the name of team chemistry. Don’t think for a second however, that Vick is preparing for spring workouts with the mindset of purposely taking a back seat to anyone.

Vick is here because he is closer to starting as a Jet than he would have been in Philly behind Nick Foles. Vick is doing the right thing as far as doing what he can to lower the media spotlight on there being any position battle. Just take his words with a grain of salt, that’s all. Mentor, my you know what. This guy is looking to show he is still the man and is here to win the job. Vick will try to turn coaches heads and set the tone as a leader from day one. Period.

Klecko Blindsides Coples and Mo

Former Jet legend Joe Klecko should be in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The guy was an All Pro at more than one position up front but a victim I believe, of being on Jets teams that never quite got far enough. Like Wesley Walker. Had his consistent body of work been on display one victorious Super Sunday, different story. Klecko brought it every week, with a lunch pail attitude that was a perfect extension of the Shea Stadium faithful.

Which is why the diehards who remember 73 for his great work on the field may have found it alarming that Klecko, who is now an analyst for SNY and rarely pulls any punches when it comes to the Jets, called out two of the young hopefuls on the defensive line days ago. The D line? Our bread and butter? The unit that is meant to be the defensive foundation for years to come? Say it ain’t so Joe!

On the topic of Quinton Coples, Klecko said that “a little bit of the time he looks like Tarzan, plays like Jane.” With regard to Mo Wilkerson, Klecko noted that there have been “a few too many plays he gives up on a little bit,” then added “He’s (Wilkerson) an unbelievable talent, but he has to put it out there every single play.”

I love you Joe but haven’t picked up on Mo as a dog at all to this point. If anything, perhaps it’s just a conditioning thing not a passion issue, as far as Mo becoming a three down threat.

As for Coples, he has shown to be more raw than many of us thought he’d be or wanted him to be upon entering the league. The guy simply hasn’t hit his stride in total just yet but it wouldn’t shock me if he came into his own over the next few seasons.

I do appreciate Klecko setting the bar high for guys who now do the work that he once did. Both players certainly have room to grow. Coples more than Mo. Expecting a little more in this societal age of celebrating mediocrity probably isn’t the worst thing in the world.

Quick Hits

– The Jets head into 2014 hopeful that the way Geno Smith and Dee Milliner ended 2013 will be the way they start the new season. Are you as hopeful?

– I’ll say it one last time. Twelve picks this week has to result in moving around the draft board and putting a package or two together. Give up some quantity for quality if the opportunity presents itself Lord Idzik. Please.

– Late round picks and UDFA’s is the area where teams with championship caliber scouting departments excel. It’s always fun to root for the diamonds in the rough during the summer. It would be nice if the Jets could grab even one overlooked steal on the cheap to go along with the blue chip talent that should be arriving by next weekend. Practical too in that adding productive players during the back end of the selection process helps in keeping the cost down.

– I wonder if any current Jets will be part of draft week trade packages. Twitter heads in Jets Nation often like to throw Kyle Wilson into their hypothetical deals. Stephen Hill too. I’ve seen a few deals where folks create moves that send Jeremy Kerley packing after drafting a top flight WR. Now I hope THAT doesn’t happen. Kerley will thrive as a slot guy with viable threats outside on both sides.

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KAsh

You cannot both move up in the draft and then yearn for some late-round gems. Late-round steals require late-round picks, and like a lottery, the more picks, the better your odds.

As for not having room on the roster for twelve picks, any new additions will bump somebody off the 53-man roster. All of our drafted players will compete for a spot. (For example, even a tight end in the first-round may not bump Cumberland off his starting spot, as there is no guarantee that MM would trust him for next year over Cumberland with all the starting duties and the full playbook.) And as in any real competition, some players will get eliminated. The real question is: do we have twelve positions that we can improve on?

1) Do we need a replacement for Harris?
2) Do we need an improvement over Landry?
3) Do we need somone to compete with Walls on the outside?
4) Is this the year Pace’s game takes a plunge?
5) Do we need someone with more potential than Cumberland? Do we need a better blocking TE than Pantale?
6) Is the right side of the o-line in trouble with Giacomini manning it?
7) Is Colon’s fourth season-ending injury in four years too much to recover from?
8) Will Winters continue to struggle?
9) Was last year for Ferguson part of a larger trend?
10) Will Mangold continue the steady decline in his play?
11) Do we need insurance in case Hill never takes that next step?
12) Will we need to replace Wilson when his contract expires next year?

While “yes” should not be the answer to all of these questions – it definitely is to some of them (#11 *cough, cough*) – we want to be prepared when we cannot answer “no.” And while we have players like Nelson, Aboushi, Ijalana, Campbell, Sudfeld, Miles, Bush, Patrick, Dowling, Patterson, and Cunningham on the roster, they are not stellar backups by any means. I expect some of our current backups to be on the roster past August, but I also expect them all to beat some good draft picks to do so. Beat some Jets out of their dream job before you beat other teams on the field in the fall.

Dan in RI

The trade talk regarding Wilson makes zero sense. He is our one sure thing at CB. Not a great player, but very solid, and very durable. Considering that we have a second year player who was up and down last year, another guy who gets hurt all the time, and some retreads who may never be better than mediocre, Wilson’s “good but not great” looks like a treasure, even if we draft a CB in the 1st or 2nd round.

Dan in RI

Kash, all great questions. I agree with you: you can never have too many draft picks. The biggest problem on this team is a lack of depth at most positions–and that is a direct consequence of Tanny’s history of trading picks. The best franchises (New England, Baltimore, etc.) guard their picks & add to them as much as possible. People obsess about getting this or that player, but almost anyone can become a bust. When the Chargers drafted Ryan Leaf at #2, they thought they had their franchise QB–and don’t get me started on all the WR busts in draft history. It is better to have lots of picks, because you never know who will be the next Tom Brady or Richard Sherman–or Vernon Gholston or Mark Sanchez. There are surprises to the upside and surprises to the downside, but if you have 12 or 13 picks, you are almost certain to hit on a few (unless the front office is just monumentally incompetent).

Steve Windeler

There will be no trading up in the 1st round. Trading back would be smart. Trading up into the 3rd, or 2nd could also be smart. If we could maximize our picks in the 2nd, and early 3rd rounds that’s where all the value in this draft is.

Steve Windeler

I’m a little tired of hearing our players were up and down last year. Sanchez was up, and down. These guys were down, and up. Bad for a stretch, then good to very good for at least the last 4 games. In the case of Q it was the last 8 games. Not the same as if it was every other game.

KAsh

@Steve

I think “up, then down” is an accurate assessment of the defense. Our defense last year ran through our three-headed Cerberus of a d-line. At the beginning of the year, they were destroying o-lines, racking up sacks for everybody, while breaking down run plays before they even got going. Toward the end of the year, Coples got into the swing of things, but the d-line wore down; they were stuffing runs rather than blowing them up and they could not get around the o-lines they faced. Oakland had a good game running against them and they were bad at pressuring Tannehill, who had the worst o-line in the league. The d-line wound up not breaking the record for the lowest YPC allowed ever, even though they were on track to do so about four weeks before the end of the season. So, “up, then down” is a good description.

http://gravatar.com/theelidman Lidman

I love that Klecko called those guys out. What both TJ and JoeCap didn’t mention is how he highlighted Richardson’s effort as a contrast to Coples and Wilkerson. There is no doubt those 2 have a ton of ability. In Mo’s case, he’s really established himself as a top tier player, but whether it’s conditioning, double teaming, scheme or some combination of the three (or something I’m missing), he was certainly less effective later in the year. JJ Watt plays every down and gets as much attention as anyone, but according to any metric, or any observation he still gets it done. In Coples case, he’s had injuries and has had to adapt to a new position-though he played with his hand in the dirt plenty.

Klecko played wherever the coach told him to, he played hurt, he rushed the passer, he stopped the run and he always gave 100%. He KNOWS what it takes to be an elite defensive lineman. He said Richardson is doing all he can, and these 2 need to give more. Hopefully, that will strike a chord. This team’s best chance at success this year is if this group dominates from start to finish, for 16 games. They need to stop the run and put consistent pressure on the QB. To do that, you need to be in shape and mentally tough enough to ‘bring it’ for 4Q.

Maybe they should bring Klecko in to training camp to ride these boys….

Frank Antonelli

Smokescreen!!! No-one knows who Idzik will pick or whether he will trade up. Listen to former NY Jets scout Joe Bommarito on Jets Nation Radio. He categorically denied that the Jets would have drafted Tavon Austin!!! He said some scouts were high on him but he wasn’t high on the final board that Idzik created. Obviously good final evaluation since Austin was highly disappointing.

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